Master Learner Mindset - The Beginning

The world we live in is an open field for us to play, experience, grow, and thrive. It may not always feel this way, but it is true. Even when it feels like there are barriers in front of you or like the walls are caving in, you can make your own way and find abundance and peace.

Does this sound too good to be true? Like a view with rose-colored glasses on? Well, let’s do a short thought experiment. Close your eyes and picture a sunrise. It’s a new day and you’ve just woken up. What is in front of you? The sun, its light, and not much else except the time you have and what you’ll do with it. Now, think of the world this way. Each day you wake up just as the sun rises and you have opportunities to act, feel, and experience a wide variety of things.

This is your opportunity. We all have it, and it is real whether we decide to act or not. But what about yesterday? The realities of today? Your plans for tomorrow? These are what make your opportunity unique. They are what make up your place in society, your culture, your job, your family, your reality. They are not to be underestimated, ignored, or disregarded. However, their importance does not mean they are all that is.

Within you lies a spark for creation and life-affirming practices that can bring you joy, pleasure, truth, wisdom, and understanding. It is up to you to kindle this flame, and what you need within your mind, body, heart, and soul to make it happen.

In these spaces you will find your hopes, your dreams, your skills, and your strengths. You’ll also find your struggles, your pains, your fears, and your doubts. The question is, in this balance, where will you place the weight of your own intention? Will you look the future in the face with courage or will you bask in memories of past failures?

Remember that everything you have been through has gotten you to this point. Every time you tried something and it didn’t work out was a learning opportunity. Every time you turned away from one choice to another was a movement toward future growth. We experience ups and downs on life’s journey. All of us do. We also all have the power within us to look in the mirror, pick ourselves up, and keep moving forward.

This is the core of your oasis of understanding. It begins with opportunity. Remember that the world, and specifically your world, is an open field with space for you to explore, discover, play, and build. At the center of this field is you, and through your mind’s eye you can visualize where you want to go and what you want to do. However, what if you feel uncertain about these questions? This is where learning is paramount, and why it is so crucial for you to have a Master Learner Mindset.

Learning is the genesis point of everything we do as people. We learn how to walk, talk, connect, design, build, destroy, create, and continue throughout our lives, but many of us are not taught how to do it. It is an unfortunate truth that learning how to learn is not taught in schools, at work, or at home. This means it is up to you to develop the skills yourself.

Learning is not like many other skills. It is a meta skill, meaning a skill that underpins the skills you want to learn on top of or surrounding it. When you think about knowing how to learn, what comes to mind? Note taking? Time management? Literacy? While these are all important and have an impact, they are not the tip of the spear.

Rather, think about knowing how to learn being primarily about the approach you take to new information, stories, people, places, and experiences. When you hear something new, do you start from doubt? When you run into a question, do you start from fear? When you see something new are you curious? The last several hundred years have left us systems that program us to keep our heads down, trust in instructions more than ideas, and avoid the unexpected. These mental frames are throughout our society, and these are what we need to shift in order to become better learners.

It does not matter if you are a good note taker if your notes are about doing things how they’ve always been done. It does not matter if you are good at managing your time if that time is filled with things that won’t help you grow. It does not matter if you are a good reader if all you read is meant to restrict your vision and impede your dreams. It is against these potentials that you must work, and on your own opportunities that you must focus.